April 1, 2011

Yesterday a private health clinic that conducts the testing of Los Angeles’ porn industry told NBC LA that the database holding tens of thousands of patient records had been compromised and that this information had been made available online. The statement from the Adult Industry Medical Foundation (AIM) comes several days after industry insider Mike South first posted about Porn Wikileaks, a site devoted to exposing the real names and addresses of adult performers and the connection of the leaks to AIM.

South, like many in the industry, had known about Porn Wikileaks for a while, but, like many in the industry, had held back from making it public — until the connection between the leaks and AIM became undeniable.

“People started emailing me saying ‘I only used that performer name one time, ever and that was when I tested at AIM,’” South writes in his blog. In California, adult performers are tested at least once a month.

“First I verified two people, then two more, both of whom shot only one time, but were required to get an AIM test,” South continues. “All made up a performer name and of the four, two never even used the same name on a model release and one never even shot, the shoot fell through. Yet all the names and hundreds, even thousands of others appear on this real name list on this site.”

The number, according to Gawker is over 15,000, though, as South has noted, not everyone on the database is active in the adult industry. The actual number of active performers is closer to 1,500.

If that’s not sufficiently worrisome, Porn Wikileaks itself is far more than just an exercise in providing information: the entries about porn stars refer to them as “whores” and “hookers” and when Richard Abowitz got in touch with the person who allegedly created the site, the latter offered the following reason for the site’s creation:

To get the gays out of straight porn and illegal gay pimps that have ruined porn and shut it down making condoms mandatory by the government now. The fag loving has got to stop. California is full of gay Mexicans and now they can even marry which is so wrong.

The damage is immeasurable: to date, no test results have been posted but addresses and phone numbers have been, which means thousands of working performers now have to worry about their safety even in their own homes. Those who are not working — who perhaps never did — have to worry about how the information will affect their personal lives. AIM is seeking to press charges over the breach, but they too can expect to be on the receiving end of legal action.

UPDATE: On April 2, director and Taboo mag editor Ernest Green responded to criticism about AIM. You can read his comments here.

We're your creatures, putting to words things to inform you, amuse you, educate you and move you. Be nice to us, we already have a cruel mistress in our editrix. We say that with love, of course, we do love her whip.

AIM records are available directly from content producers via 2257 records. AIM’s database doesn’t need to have been hacked for the information to have been “compromised”. an unscrupulous “secondary producer” could easily post the same information.

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That Steam allows the objectification and sexualization of female characters in a variety of its games but refuses to accept a game about actually engaging with women in a more interactive fashion is astonishingly backward.

That the site doesn’t take measures to protect user content and has shown incompetence or negligence in regard to user privacy, all the while prohibiting victims from warning others about predatory behavior creates an environment where it is nearly impossible for members of the community to take care of themselves and one another. By enabling FetLife to continue espousing a code of silence, allowing the spinning self-created security issues as “attacks,” and not pointing out how disingenuous FetLife statements about safety are, we are allowing our community to become a breeding ground for exploitation.

Should people who benefit (parents, siblings, children, roommates!) from the earnings of “commercial sex acts” (any sexual conduct connected to the giving or receiving of something of value) be charged with human trafficking? Should someone who creates obscene material that is deemed “deviant” be charged as with human trafficking? Should someone who profits from obscene materials be charged with human trafficking? Should people transporting obscene materials be charged with human trafficking? Should a person who engages in sex with someone claiming to be above the age of consent or furnishing a fake ID to this effect be charged with human trafficking? What if I told you the sentences for that kind of conviction were eight, 14 or 20 years in prison, a fine not to exceed $500,000, and life as a registered sex offender?

If you are a woman, you might be given a chance to prove yourself in this community. Since there is no standard definition of what a “geek” is and it will vary from one judge to the next anyway, chances of failing are high (cake and grief counseling will be available after the conclusion of the test!). If you somehow manage to succeed, you’ll be tested again and again by anyone who encounters you until you manage to establish yourself like, say, Felicia Day. But even then, you’ll be questioned. As a woman, your whole existence within the geek community will be nothing but a series of tests — if you’re lucky. If you aren’t lucky, you’ll be harassed and threatened and those within the culture will tacitly agree that you deserve it.

Zak’s original field, it turns out, is economics, a far cry from the hearts and teddy bears we imagine when we consider his nickname. But after performing experiments on generosity, Zak stumbled on the importance of trust in interactions, which led him, rather inevitably, to research about oxytocin. Oxytocin, you might remember, is a hormone that has been linked previously to bonding — between mothers and children primarily, but also between partners. What Zak has done is take the research a step further, arguing in his recent book, The Moral Molecule, that oxytocin plays a role in determining whether we are good or evil.

Let’s talk about the strippers. Whether they like to be half-naked or not, whether they enjoy turning you on or not, there’s one thing they all have in common: they’re working. Whether you think that taking one’s clothes off for money is a great choice of career is really beside the point (is it a possibility for you to make $500 per hour at your job without a law degree? Just asking). These women are providing fantasy, yes, but that is their job. And as a patron of the establishment where they work, you need to treat them like you would anyone else who provides a service to you.

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Sex and the 405 is what your newspaper would look like if it had a sex section.

Here you’ll find news about the latest research being conducted to figure out what drives desire, passion, and other sex habits; reviews of sex toys, porn and other sexy things; coverage of the latest sex-related news that have our mainstream media's panties up in a bunch; human interest pieces about sex and desire; interviews with people who love sex, or hate sex, or work in sex, or work to enable you to have better sex; opinion pieces that relate to sex and society; and the sex-related side of celebrity gossip. More...